From Monday to Wednesday this week, I had been stuck in school with post exam activities. $12 per day, and 4 hours long (excluding recess). The materials we are given are not worth more than $2 (eg. wire and a piece of A4 paper), and we are hardly taught much. People could be seen sleeping and I was smart enough to bring a book on Wednesday. Zeng Xi put it very well, "Robbery la can".
Then today, we spent the first half of school in the hall, listening to talks, then playing games. It wasn't that bad. But then after recess, we went back to class. There were 13/42 people in class. So we had some forum like thing and the remaining/most of the time was spent reading/playing/sleeping. Though the school gave us class time without teachers' supervision, I'm surprised the noise level in the classroom block wasn't bad. I think everyone was too bored to even talk loudly or they were probably catching up on sleep. Oh, but a handful were busy going shopping at the bookstore for gifts for CIP.
I spent the classroom time reading, then eventually sleeping. No, actually, eventually waking up. I fell asleep after reading Boy and Going Solo for about 2.5 hours straight. After some time, I suddenly got poked and had to wake up. Ah and guess who - it was Jie Ying who suddenly came back from the Japan Exchange thing. If she tries that a few years later, I think by then, ageing would have gotten the better of me and I'd probably get a heart attack.
After school, I took 174 to Tangs at Orchard. As I am like some tourist on Orchard road, I didn't really know when to get off the bus. Fortunately, I met Ruri who was going to Taka (takashimaya, for my own reference/reminder). I managed to get her to help tell me when to get off.
I met mom and we walked over to Mount Elizabeth Medical Centre. I saw quite a number of students at a particular doctor's clinic. It specialised in bone problems, backbone I think. I took a hearing test. They only tested up to 8kHz, so I managed to hear the high frequency pretty normally. I had trouble with 0.5kHz (right) and 1.5kHz (left). The higher frequency part of the graph had a sharp drop around 6kHz for both ears. So in conclusion, a mild hearing loss, but not to the extent of needing a hearing aid - yet. The hearing loss isn't the curable type. That's because it's an internal injury to the nerves that pick up the filtered sounds that pass through the ear drum. My internal nerve injury is sound-induced. Internal injury can also be caused by illness or genetics. Then the doctor asked if I had problems hearing people in noisy places, I strongly agreed. And then he said something to my mom, like, oh there is some sign of it starting/taking effect. I don't really know what he was hinting at but I think it is tinnitus (hearing high pitched sounds in the ear, or any sound that doesn't go "lynn.. lynn.. do this..." or something of that sort. err.. that would be hallucinating).
The doctor did an otoscopy. He used this metal rod with a camera attached and stuck it into my ear. I was able to watch the movie live in front of me on a screen. Quite cool. I got to see my ear drum and the outer ear. There was no build up of ear wax, which means one cure/cause eliminated. Couldn't see any nerves because the ear drum blocks up that place. It acts like filter paper, and the outer ear like the filter funnel, filtering sounds. I was given a short bio lesson with this model of an ear, and he stopped once in a while to marvel at God's wonderful creation.
The doctor is a music lover and was talking about recent and upcoming concerts. He said all musicians are deaf, just to different extents. Now I'm starting to think of as many musicians as I know who may actually be deaf. I wasn't asked to put ear plugs or stop violin. Not curable, but need monitoring, so I have to go back next year. Like an eye check.
I reached home at 5 and then did violin practice. Today was a tiring day. Tomorrow is part 1 of checking of scripts. Oh no..
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